Listed below are the solutions for the NYT Strands puzzle #496 as we speak, launched on July twelfth, 2025, and a few hints that can assist you clear up them.
The New York Occasions are identified for the big selection of video games they publish for readers to finish on the each day. That they had additionally revealed the viral phrase sport, Wordle, in 2022, so as to add to their assortment.
A brand new sport has been launched by the paper, referred to as Strands, which is presently in beta. On this sport, there’s a theme of phrases on a board and it’s essential to discover the theme associated phrases.
After getting discovered a theme associated phrase, it’s going to keep stuffed in blue and to create these phrases, you will have to pull or kind the letters. All the letters on the board are used to make up phrases for the theme and the letters don’t overlap into different phrases.

There may be additionally a “spangram” which is a phrase on the board that describes the theme of the puzzle for the day. It’s going to contact two reverse sides of the board and could also be two phrases.
After getting discovered the spangram phrase, it’s going to keep highlighted in yellow.
An instance of a spangram is FRUIT, and the opposite themed phrases can be PEAR, BANANA and APPLE.

If you’re struggling to seek out any phrases regarding the theme, you’ll be able to attempt to discover different phrases on the board, which is not going to keep highlighted, however will provide help to to get hints. You’ll need to seek out three non-theme phrases to get a touch.
Strands 496 Hints At present (July twelfth, 2025)
Today’s theme or trace for the puzzle is, “IN THE BALLPARK” and there are seven theme phrases to be discovered.

Extra hints that can assist you clear up the Strands puzzle launched as we speak is:
- One phrase within the Spangram.
- There are seven letters within the Spangram phrase as we speak.
Strands 496 Spangram Reply At present (July twelfth, 2025)
With each puzzle, there’s a spangram, which helps describe the theme. The spangram for the puzzle launched on July twelfth is:
STADIUM
The phrase begins on the left, hits the fitting aspect and ends close to the sting of the grid.
The precise location of the Spangram phrase may be seen under:

Strands 496 Answer At present (July twelfth, 2025)
Listed below are all the different themed phrases for the Stands 496 puzzle:
- HELMET
- JUMBOTRON
- BULLPEN
- GLOVE
- PITCHER
- PEANUTS

Tell us within the feedback under which phrases you bought caught on.
